Xuyouzhen1 (@徐宥箴1): The administrative department requires that childbearing in our video games comply with family planning. That is to say that if you have second child in the game, we have to fine you a virtual social support fee. Piyaoyuzhenxiang (@辟谣与真相) I am not making this up. Here is the document in full, including the source and images. (March 19, 2015)

Xu’s Weibo post includes a screenshot of slides from a PowerPoint presentation on “censorship workflow” in video games:

Ministry of Culture Online Game Content Censorship Workflow

Internet Culture Office, Bureau of Culture Markets

December 10, 2010

Contents

Putting on Record Domestically Produced Online Games

Censoring Content of Imported Online Games

Guide to Ministry of Culture’s Online System for Reporting Online Game Content Inspections and Scheduling Inquiries

Key Points in Self-Censorship of Online Games

System for Childbearing

To cultivate players’ sense of responsibility and correct knowledge of teaching the next generation, do not create a negative influence on minors’ moral qualities and view of life;

Do not show obscene or pornographic content;

Children must not be lured into playing for extended periods of time. Do not include elements that will lead minors to indulge in gaming;

Comply with the Family Planning Law and the Law on the Protection of Minors;

Do not include other functions that would negatively influence minors.

System for Pets

Pet care must avoid keeping players online for extended periods of time. Do not include elements that will lead minors to indulge in gaming;

Do not include content that violates animal protection laws, including cruelty to animals. The hunting of or care for animals that are national treasures cannot be goals [of the game]. Pets cannot be used as tools of attack;

Do not include other functions that would negatively influence minors.

Xu has also shared the complete PowerPoint on Baidu Cloud here. He goes on in a reply to his original post about other restrictions on game content:

My company has a game called “Dream Emperor” (梦想帝王) where, as emperor, you gather renowned generals, and then you gather beautiful women to be your concubines. It didn’t pass the censors because they said China practices monogamy, so the game couldn’t have concubines. We said this is an emperor from antiquity, so he has to have concubines. It was no use. We changed the concubines to palace maids and finally passed the censors. This really happened to our company.

The comment thread is full of disbelief. Some netizens ask sarcastically about how else real-world policies are honored in games. Cuizi (@啐子) wonders, “If a mother and father are both only children, they can have a second child, right?” (夫妻是独生的可以有二胎不是吗？) (Couples can now have a second child if just one parent is an only child.) Tiantiandaixiezuoye (@天天代写作业) wants to know, “When female players give birth, do they get maternity leave?” (女玩家游戏生孩后有产假吗).

Beijinghuashisanshi’erdu (@北京华氏三十二度) takes censorship to its logical extreme: “In the final game, you can only have a bunch of eunuchs fighting another bunch of eunuchs with feather dusters!” (最后的游戏只能是一堆太监用鸡毛掸子打另外一堆太监！)

The court made that suggestion in a report on its work in 2014 that was published Wednesday. It said that Mr. Zhou had, like Bo Xilai, the disgraced Politburo member who was convicted and sentenced to life in prison in September 2013, “trampled on rule by law, wrecked party unity and engaged in nonorganizational political activities.”

The document did not say whether Mr. Bo and Mr. Zhou engaged in those activities together, but by mentioning the two in the same sentence, it added fuel to speculation that the two men, as well as other top leaders such as Xu Caihou, a former general whose death was reported Sunday, had formed a faction.

This month, Zhou Ruijin, a former deputy editor in chief of the Communist Party’s flagship newspaper, People’s Daily, said in a commentary that the cases of Mr. Zhou, Mr. Bo, General Xu and another former top official, Ling Jihua, were “deeply entwined.”

According to the Beijing Youth Daily, Zhuang Deshui from Peking University, an expert on corruption, said the words of the Supreme People’s Court implied that Mr. Zhou and other officials had “done something like the Gang of Four, creating small collectivities of interests, attempting to win power and influencing the political attitudes of the public.”

That historical analogy is powerful for anyone in China. The Gang of Four, a group that included Mao’s widow, Jiang Qing, was tried in 1981 over its role in grabbing political power during the latter stages of the 1966-76 Cultural Revolution. [Source]

The Beijing Youth Daily article[Chinese] from which the New York Times quoted Zhuang Deshui above also included Central Party School professor Zhang Xixian’s interpretation of the term “non-organizational political activities,” including a note on the unprecedented nature of the rhetoric. CDT translates:

Central Party School’s Zhang Xixian, an expert on Party construction, has not come in contact with the term “non-organizational political activity” in previous studies. He told the Beijing Youth Daily that while “non-organizational activity” is a phrase used in Party construction, this was the first time he heard the phrase “non-organizational political activity.”

[…] Zhang Xixian believes, if “political activity” refers to political principles and political orientation, “non-organizational political activities” must refer to activity opposed to the political direction of Party leadership, up to the point that it breaks Party policies and principles. [These types of activities] are anti-Party, betraying the basic properties of Party objectives.

njWuleizhe (@nj无泪者): If they’re anti-Party, doesn’t that also mean they’re anti-themselves? I don’t get it.

如果他们反党，那不是反自己么？不懂．

* * *

Laxueshinühai (@落雪是女孩): The Party commands the gun. What the Party calls the rule of law is the rule of law, and what it says isn’t most definitely isn’t!

党指挥枪，党说法治就是法治，党说不是就不是！

* * *

Sihanglang (@思行郎): This begs the question: who represents the Party? Is it one person, nine people, or 80,000,000 people? If different Party members hold different political views, how can you tell which ones are “anti-Party”? Who is the arbitrator?

那问题来了：谁代表“党”？是一个人，还是9个人，还是8000万个人。如果不同的党员政见不同，那究竟谁是“反党”？由谁仲裁？

* * *

cruyiff：This Party is so funny… I wouldn’t be surprised if the Party chief turned out to be anti-Party…

这个政党有点意思……党主席反党也不奇怪……..

* * *

Liyannü (@李岩女): With these folks on the throne, how are the common people supposed to differentiate between “non-organizational political activities” and “organizational political activities”?

当这些人在位时，百姓如何辨别这是“非组织政治活动”还“组织政治活动”？

* * *

Qinwangxiaoshuo (@秦往小说): Saying that Bo and Zhou are anti-Party is simply ridiculous. They exploited the Party, [used their membership] for pretense, and obtained much benefit from the Party, how could they be anti-Party? No matter where or when, they shouted their support for the Party. This is just as silly as accusing General Secretary Zhao Ziyang of splitting the Party was.

A few experts also weighed in on Weibo. Outspokenly liberal People’s University political science professor Zhang Ming said, “Back in the day, if you were anti-those two people [Bo and Zhou], it meant you were anti-Party” (在那个时候，反这两个人，就等于反党). Fengxiang County [Shaanxi] People’s Court Judge Wen Jinrang commented, “‘Non-organizational political activity’ is not even a legal term, so why was it used by the Supreme People’s Court?” (“非组织政治活动”不是一个法律术语，为什么要由最高法提出？！)

]]>http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2015/03/experts-netizens-weigh-in-on-zhou-yongkangs-non-organizational-political-activities/feed/0I Love the Chinese Dream; A Coffee, Please, and Creamhttp://chinadigitaltimes.net/2015/02/love-chinese-dream-coffee-please-cream/
http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2015/02/love-chinese-dream-coffee-please-cream/#commentsFri, 06 Feb 2015 21:12:48 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=181140Young Chinese at home and abroad may be outspokenly nationalistic, but that nationalism is more nuanced than often credited. Territorial disputes can provoke protest and xenophobia, but also sardonic online poetry.

While the Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands dispute simmers, some Japanese expats in China are trying to keep tempers from boiling over, according to a Weibo post now making the rounds:

Shitouma911 (@石头妈911): My colleague just told me the funniest thing. He has a friend who lives in Gubei. A lot of little Japanese live there. He has shopping the market one day when he heard a little Japanese nearby buying meat. He didn’t ask the price, but started instead with this: “The Diaoyu Islands are China’s, I’d like to buy some meat.”

The original post is no longer on Shitouma911’s profile, but screenshots and the quoted text continue to circulate on Weibo. It’s as if the Japanese expat (derided as “little”) had to state the politically correct territorial claim in order to feed himself. The post has inspired netizens to invent their own rhyming couplets that reimagine political slogans as prerequisites to ordering at a restaurant, running errands, or getting out of a cab. Without the comment thread attached to the vanished post by Shitouma911, it would be difficult to find the first couplet—but whoever did started a real trend. The post had 5,342 comments when this screenshot was taken:

CDT has translated a few and included the pinyin transcription to give a sense of the rhyme:

SinueL (@肆虐L): I swear my life to Daddy Xi, no pepper in those spuds for me.

]]>http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2015/02/love-chinese-dream-coffee-please-cream/feed/0Netizen Voices: How China’s Soccer Team Will Winhttp://chinadigitaltimes.net/2015/01/netizen-voices-chinas-soccer-team-will-win/
http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2015/01/netizen-voices-chinas-soccer-team-will-win/#commentsTue, 20 Jan 2015 18:42:38 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=180592China’s national soccer team loses a lot. They have qualified just once for the World Cup, in 2002, where South Korea defeated them in the first round. The team made it to the finals of the Asian Cup in 2004, only for Japan to beat them 3-1. A devastating 5-1 loss to Thailand in 2013 inspired soul-searching cartoons.

Before the Asian Cup, Dad?dy? Xi went to talk to the head of the Gen?eral Admin?istra?tion of Sport, Liu? Peng…

Before the Asian Cup, Daddy Xi went to talk to the head of the General Administration of Sport, Liu Peng, and said:

“I don’t care if you have a foreign coach or a Chinese coach. If the team plays well, I’ll come greet you at the airport. If the team plays poorly, Secretary Qishan will greet you at the airport…”

Then Liu Peng went to talk to China’s National Football Team coaches and players, and said, “If you play well, you’ll take a Qantas flight back. If you play poorly, you’ll take Malaysian Airlines…”

Then, they won.

After they won, an angry mob surrounded the national team bus. The team captain, Zheng Zhi, almost broke down in tears. “We were cursed when we didn’t win. Well, today we won, and everyone’s yelling at us anyway!”

It’s not easy being on the China National Football Team! Head Coach Alain Perrin comforted Zheng, “Don’t worry about them. They aren’t Chinese football fans—those are Chinese sports betting fans.” (January 16, 2015)

]]>http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2015/01/netizen-voices-chinas-soccer-team-will-win/feed/0Minitrue: Wenzhou Police Purchase Trojan Horsehttp://chinadigitaltimes.net/2015/01/minitrue-wenzhou-police-purchase-surveillance-equipment/
http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2015/01/minitrue-wenzhou-police-purchase-surveillance-equipment/#commentsThu, 08 Jan 2015 00:16:34 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=180329The following censorship instructions, issued to the media by government authorities, have been leaked and distributed online. The name of the issuing body has been omitted to protect the source.

The police department in an economic-development zone there in December said on an official website that it planned to award a 149,000 yuan ($24,000) contract to a domestic state-run company to supply it software services for what it described as a “Trojan Horse.” A Trojan Horse is a program that helps others pilfer information from an unsuspecting user.

The notice from the Wenzhou Economic and Technological Development Zone’s public security bureau explained the purpose of the Trojan Horse program and a related delivery system: “targeting mobile phones using the Android system or iPhone after jailbreak for real-time surveillance on information like phone calls, text messages and photos on mobile phones.” “Jailbreak” refers to the steps phone owners sometimes take to modify their gadget’s software to get around restrictions placed by manufacturers and carriers so that users can tap multiple app stores and other services.

The notice was posted the zone’s website as part of a transparency initiative related to public spending. But it became unavailable sometime Wednesday after online users pointed to it and the news spread on the Weibo micrioblog service. […]

[…] It isn’t clear whether the services were supplied or deployed. [Source]

China’s government insists it staunchly opposes hacking and cyber-attacks, and has denied U.S. government accusations that it spies on foreign companies. State media here has also accused the United States of hypocrisy after former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden revealed details of the NSA’s own cyber-surveillance program.

Reacting to the Wenzhou report, Chinese Web users pointed out Article 286 of the country’s criminal law that threatens up to five years in prison for anyone who “deliberately make and spread disruptive programs such as computer viruses.”

But the revelation did not come as a surprise to citizens here, who live in a culture where surveillance is central to the Party’s effort to “maintain security” – which often means measures to suppress dissent and prolong its rule.

[…] “The government buys Trojans, and then publicizes it! The government is improving,” one person posted on social media. [Source]

米娜多丶: The PSB’s work is straightforward and upright, practical and realistic, and subject to public inspection. The stark contrast between “buying a Trojan horse” and the “PRISM incident” only serves to shame the U.S. imperialists. They couldn’t do better! (January 7, 2015)

Since directives are sometimes communicated orally to journalists and editors, who then leak them online, the wording published here may not be exact. The date given may indicate when the directive was leaked, rather than when it was issued. CDT does its utmost to verify dates and wording, but also takes precautions to protect the source.

Liu, who was shot dead in his squad car last month, was buried on Sunday. He and his colleague Rafael Ramos were killed by Ismaaiyl Brinsley, who then killed himself. Brinsley had earlier made statements on social media expressing his anger over police officers’ violence toward unarmed black men, precipitated by the deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Garner. Relatives of Liu flew in from China to pay their last respects.

Global Times Chief Editor Hu Xijin, notorious for putting a positive spin on bad situations, had only good things to say about Liu’s last rites. He instead criticized the treatment of the police force in China by the government and “public opinion” (舆论):

胡锡进: Watching the solemn funeral New York held for the Chinese-American police officer, I was deeply moved. China isn’t this good to its police. They’re at the beck and call of officials, toiling away in and putting themselves in danger, but they are paid little. There are often people within the people’s public opinion who incite revenge on the police–people like Yang Jia murder innocent officers, yet many people online applaud this. There are officers who have died and not gotten the respect they deserve. Let’s start to treat with kindness those who serve us. Support giving the police a raise. I beseech public opinion to respect them. (January 5, 2015)

Hu Xijin opened an old wound when he mentioned Yang Jia, who was executed in 2008 for killing six Shanghai police officers the year before. At the time, many netizens showed sympathy for Yang, who they believe was beaten by the police for allegedly stealing a bicycle. His swift and secretive trial raised human rights concerns in China and abroad. “My God! You’re bringing up Yang Jia?!” (我擦！还敢提杨佳?!) asked 明暗交界线的线 in a reply to Hu. “Why was Yang Jia humiliated by the police? Why didn’t the government ever explain anything to him? Will you make his court hearing public?” (杨佳当初是怎么被警察羞辱的，怎么一直不见官方的说法呢？庭审记录敢公布不?)

Elsewhere on Weibo, people are concerned that those public servants who have sacrificed their lives to protect the people are snubbed by the government. On January 2, five firefighters died in Harbin while battling a blaze in a warehouse. The local government released a statement praising senior officials for putting out the fire, only mentioning the casualties at the very end. The officers who died were not named. The statement caused an outcry online:

天道酬勤水秀峦峰: Seeing the highly regimented funeral for Officer Liu Wenjian in New York, I can’t help but mutter, “We should have an even grander funeral for the five firefighters in Harbin who sacrificed their lives.” (January 6, 2015)

On the Quora-like site Zhihu, someone has juxtaposed photos from Harbin and New York. In the top photo, a crowd of officials and doctors hovers over an injured firefighter. Below, hundreds of New York police officers line a road in Brooklyn, heads bowed for Officer Liu’s funeral procession.

Read the original comments cited in this post, plus more netizen commentary at CDT Chinese.

The blocking began last Friday and has ignited anger and frustration among many Internet users in China. Data from Google shows traffic to Gmail dropping to zero from Chinese servers.

The new step in blocking Gmail has consequences that go well beyond making it difficult for users to access personal emails. Some foreign companies use Gmail as their corporate email service, for example. Now, the companies will have to ensure that their employees havesoftware known as VPNs, or virtual private networks, to access Gmail.

[…] Google has for years been a target of the Chinese government, and some official publications have cited the company as one component of a Western conspiracy to undermine China. For example, Chinese officials had insisted Google censor its search results, a request that angered some top executives at Google, and they refused to comply. Chinese companies like Baidu, which has a popular search engine here, benefit from the official crackdown on Google.

Chinese and foreign Internet users in China expressed their frustration on Monday at the government’s new blocking measures.

“They shouldn’t have blocked Google or Gmail; it’s against the spirit of the Internet,” Yuan Shengang, the chief executive of Netentsec, a Beijing-based cybersecurity company, said in a telephone interview. […] [Source]

Gmail and other Google services were blocked in China in June, ahead of 25th anniversary of Beijing’s deadly suppression of the Tiananmen Square pro-democracy protests. Access to Gmail through browser windows was blocked.

Still, Gmail users were able to access it using third-party email applications such as Microsoft Corp. ’s Outlook or Apple Inc. ’s Mail. Now that access appears to have been cut.

Google clashed with Beijing in 2010 after the company decided to stop censoring its Internet search results in China. Google shifted most of its Chinese operations to Hong Kong as a result, and many of company’s services on the mainland have since worked intermittently. [Source]

I just realized that blocking Gmail could be the GFW [Great Firewall]’s greatest milestone. This is different from big websites that have been blocked before. Email is one of the most important ways that people communicate personally and for work, and is also the most important tool for for registering for websites and recovering passwords. The effect will be felt both inside and outside the Wall. Even so, netizen opposition has been moderate. When the GFW blocks other websites in the future, it won’t face any established resistance.

This time Gmail’s been blocked. All domestic email servers are unable to send and receive Gmails. Scaling the wall to check email is no problem—the U.S. has not yet realized the Chinese Dream, and Gmail is still there. The Great Chinese LAN’s most sinister trick—sealing off communications between email servers—is not high tech, they could do this years ago. But did they dare? Only after Steamed Bun Xi’s rise to power do they have the courage for this type of craziness!!

The former security chief, Zhou Yongkang, is the highest-ranking party leader to be prosecuted since the Gang of Four, including Mao Zedong’s widow, Jiang Qing, were put on trial 34 years ago in the aftermath of the Cultural Revolution.

Xinhua, the official news agency, said in a terse announcement that the decision to expel Mr. Zhou, 72, had been made at a meeting on Friday of the party’s powerful Politburo. It said he also had been placed “under judicial probe,” laying the basis for a prosecution. […] [Source]

Xinhua said members of the standing committee of the politburo, the country’s highest governing body, decided on Friday to revoke Zhou’s party membership and transfer his case and “relevant clues” to China’s judicial authorities “to deal with them in accordance with the law”.

[…] “Upon investigation, Zhou Yongkang seriously violated the party’s political, organisational and confidential discipline,” Xinhua said. “He used his position to give illegal benefits to many people, and took bribes directly and via his family members; abused his position to help his family members, mistresses and friends gain huge profits through business activities at the cost of state assets; leaked party and state secrets; severely breached regulations of corruption by taking a great amount of assets belonging to other people; committed adultery with a number of women, and traded money and power for sexual advantages.”

His actions have “greatly harmed the party’s image,” Xinhua continued, “and have caused great losses to the party and the people”. [Source]

]]>http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2014/12/zhou-yongkang-arrested-expelled-party/feed/0Thai Weibo Offers “Kind Explanation” of Censorshiphttp://chinadigitaltimes.net/2014/11/thai-weibo-offers-kind-explanation-censorship/
http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2014/11/thai-weibo-offers-kind-explanation-censorship/#commentsMon, 03 Nov 2014 23:01:28 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=178770Thaksin Shinawatra and his sister Yingluck–both former prime ministers of Thailand, both ousted in coups–just visited China, causing such a stir back home with a viral panda-hugging photo that the current Thai prime minister warned the media to stop “presenting news” about Thaksin. The Shinawatra siblings, along with Yingluck’s son, also visited their ancestral home in Guangdong last Friday.

泰国头条新闻: Kind Explanation: Recently, former prime minister of Thailand Yingluck visited China with her older brother, former prime minister Thaksin, and her son. She posted photos and text to various social media platforms throughout her trip. Does this raise questions for mainland readers, many of whom cannot access [these platforms]? Let us offer a kind explanation. Foreign phone numbers set to international roaming in China can access all social media platforms. It is only Chinese phone numbers that are blocked.

游小龙YXL: Too many people in China don’t understand the actual situation. What would we do if everything were open and they were harmed by outside forces? This question will keep you up at night.

国内太多不明真相的群众，如果都开放了，被境外势力伤害了怎么办呢？想想这个问题，夜里都很难入睡。

BoyanJLU: That’s why young people in TW [Taiwan] and HK [Hong Kong] started protests again and again. It’s not about whether they love China. It’s not about whether they wanna be Chinese. It’s about defending a LIFESTYLE.

刘强UP: Thank you for your “kind” hint. It looks like I know what I’m not supposed to know.

]]>http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2014/11/thai-weibo-offers-kind-explanation-censorship/feed/0Envoy to Iceland Allegedly Arrested for Spyinghttp://chinadigitaltimes.net/2014/09/ambassador-iceland-allegedly-arrested-spying/
http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2014/09/ambassador-iceland-allegedly-arrested-spying/#commentsFri, 19 Sep 2014 20:08:05 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=177371China’s ambassador to Iceland Ma Jisheng has reportedly been arrested along with his wife on suspicion of leaking state secrets to Japan. Ma had twice previously served at Beijing’s Tokyo embassy. From Quartz:

Chinese ambassador to Iceland Ma Jisheng and his wife, Zhong Yue, have been arrested (link in Chinese) by Beijing on suspicion of leaking national security secrets to Japan, according to a Chinese-language media report.

[…] Ma, who served as secretary in China’s embassy in Japan (link in Chinese) in the mid 1990s and again as commissar in Toyko between 2004 and 2008, has espoused the typical Chinese criticism of Japan. In February, he penned an editorial (link in Chinese and Icelandic) in an Icelandic newspaper criticizing the visit to the controversial Yasukuni Shrine by Japan’s prime minister Shinzo Abe.

The Icelandic news site Grapevine reported earlier this month that Ma left the country in January—before the editorial was written—and has not been heard from since. A spokeswoman for the Icelandic government said it had been notified that “Ma would not return to his post for personal reasons,” Reuters reported. [Source]

Norman同学: Envoys abroad defecting and becoming spies—in modern times we only know of two instances worldwide. The first was Chinese ambassador to Korea Li Bin, and the second is again a Chinese diplomat, this Ma Jisheng. Just a fucking embarrassment. (September 17, 2014)

Following foreign news outlets reporting on Ma’s arrest, the Global Times warned their English-language readers to “be wary of [the] espionage trap surrounding us.” With news of Ma’s alleged offense just breaking despite the fact that he appears to have been implicated as early as January, the editorial mentioned: “A number of major cases that startled the Chinese elite were not released to the public through the media. In actuality, reporting such incidents will educate many people by letting them know how close those manipulators of overseas intelligence agencies are to us.”

Although the survey showed ten top-ranking social ills, People’s Tribune asked about 13 problems in total. “Self-abuse,” a sort of masochism involving “criticism of the Communist Party,” was also highlighted as a major problem. From NetEase [Chinese]:

The People’s Tribune Questionnaire Center recently put together a list of the 13 biggest social ills [in Chinese society]. One of the issues mentioned, “self-abuse,” refers to criticism of the Communist Party—and those who benefit most from within the system are criticizing the party the hardest. “Lack of faith,” “spectator mentality,” and “social anxiety disorder” ranked as China’s top three current social ills.

[…] In general, Chinese society has been functioning very well—a wave of anti-corruption is sweeping over the land, society has taken the eight-point guidelines [for official conduct] deeply to heart, China’s economy continues to develop steadily, and life in general is standardized and orderly. However, because of the incredibly dramatic societal transformation that China is going through, all of the overlapping aspects of China’s social structure, lifestyles, modes of behavior and values are changing. Some maladjustment and disharmony is inevitable. This has caused social ills to become prominent issues during this modernization transformation process. Social ills are social abnormalities that differ from China’s social norms or healthy state; they are an overall summation of the problems, contradictions, conflicts, confusion, and other phenomena present in society. Through in-depth surveys, sifting, and refining, the People’s Tribune Questionnaire Center has put together the following preliminary list of the 13 most commonly reflected social ills.

On ConsensusNet (共识网), netizens offered analysis of these social ills, pointing to the combination of authoritarianism and the free market:

前尘往事: What Chinese citizens have lost is political faith. All social ills originate from this.

国人丧失的是政治信仰,一切社会病态由此而生.

不老的传说: I don’t know if I should believe the author’s conclusions or believe the “Three Confidences.” How are core values established? Is it by writing down 24 words? Or can they be cultivated like you say? Let’s not forget society’s role in one’s education. Baiting people during the Anti-Rightist movement, the rhetoric of the Great Leap Forward, the catastrophe of the Cultural Revolution, the split personality of our leaders’ public and private lives, etc., etc.… all this, at every moment, is forming the values of the people of China.

安然: These 10 big “social ills” are commonly known as “moral defeat, declining morale.” Trends come from the top and customs come from the bottom. Over the last ten-plus years of double-digit GDP growth, the country’s leaders were leading 1.3 billion people in singing “Towards money, towards power, towards money; our team marches towards corruption,” marching us all down the old capitalist road. Rampant official corruption, the polarization of society, the destruction of the environment, rising public grievances… a combination of the cruelty of capitalism and the power politics of socialism (the overall tax burden is at nearly 47%, yet social security programs are declining). What is society to do? These look like ills, but they’re really “powder kegs.”

木文一: What are the root causes of these current social ills? Has the author thought about this? We have seen socioeconomic development, and people are rich now, but what about the political lives of the people? Political life means participation in politics—democratic management and democratic elections. But as soon as one brings up democracy, officials become silent. Why is this?

]]>http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2014/09/netizen-voices-real-source-social-ills/feed/0Netizen Voices: Call Me “Daddy Xi”http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2014/09/netizen-voices-call-daddy-xi/
http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2014/09/netizen-voices-call-daddy-xi/#commentsFri, 12 Sep 2014 21:22:05 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=177134Xi Jinping’s career as China’s president and the Party’s highest official has been marked as much by his charisma as his administration’s heavy-handed efforts to consolidate political control and crackdown on dissent. Xi’s charm stands in stark contrast to that of his dry and stiffly bureaucratic predecessor Hu Jintao, and state media has been consistent in drawing attention to Xi as a man of the people.

In celebration of China’s 30th Teachers’ Day this week, the president visited Beijing Normal University, where he called on teachers to “have lofty ideals, solid knowledge and a kind heart.” State media focused on the rockstar reception Xi enjoyed, when 500 students and teachers gathered in cheer. On Weibo, China Youth Daily reported students shouted slogans like “The Secretary-General has worked hard for us!“ (总书记辛苦了！). One teacher said Xi’s reception was like a “superstar concert.”

原乡记: Calling him “Daddy” is completely servile. But it doesn’t necessarily mean “father”–it’s also a way to put yourself down.

叫“大大”，奴才相尽显。即使不一定是父亲的意思，也是自我的人格矮化。

龙的精灵: Heh, the slaves have been working hard, too. Without you, there’d be no imperial power. Ha ha, I like seeing a sea of slaves.

呵呵，奴才们也辛苦。没有你们就没有皇权。哈哈我喜欢一望无际的奴才。

The “daddy” (大大) in “Daddy Xi” comes from Shaanxi, the province where Xi’s father, Xi Zhongxun, was born. The same term can also mean “uncle,” but either way connotes familiarity and warmth.

Some netizens have pushed back against “Daddy Xi,” saying the Beijing Normal students “have everything but daddy” (五行缺爹 wǔxíng qūe dīe). This is a play on the idiom “have all five elements but earth” (五行缺土 wǔxíng qūe tǔ), describing the inauspicious state facing someone born without earth in their astrological sign. Such an unfortunate person must somehow incorporate earth into their life in other ways. Thus, to “have everything but daddy” implies slavish devotion or overcompensation.

AKTulip: If you don’t know what “daddy” means, look it up on Baidu. Shouting in the streets like this, do you have everything but daddy?

The office of the Government Information Disclosure Leading Group received your application for information disclosure on July 21 2014. According to Regulation of the People’s Republic of China on the Disclosure of Government Information (Decree of the State Council, No. 492), the answer to your inquiry is as follows:

The ministry’s dismissive response, which began circulating on various social media services, led some netizens to comment:

MyDF: The Ministry of Foreign Affairs: The Internet in our country is regulated in accordance with law. The State Internet Information Office: We have never issued an official document to block Google. Relevant agency: Blocking Google is an idea from above. Netizen: Is there anything out there that’s above the rule of law?

外交部：我国的互联网是依法管理的。国信办：未发文要求封锁google。有关部门：封google是上面的意思。网民：法律的上面是什么东西？

陶景洲: The most telling information is that the Ministry of Information has no information.

]]>http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2014/08/netizen-voices-information-disclosure-request-denied/feed/0Australian MP Back-Pedals Insults to Chinesehttp://chinadigitaltimes.net/2014/08/australian-mp-back-pedals-insults-chinese/
http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2014/08/australian-mp-back-pedals-insults-chinese/#commentsThu, 21 Aug 2014 22:38:37 +0000http://chinadigitaltimes.net/?p=176492Australian mining magnate and parliamentarian Clive Palmer made shocking comments this week that have been condemned by both Australian and Chinese officials. Palmer called the Chinese “mongrels” and “‘bastards’ who shoot their own people and covet Australian resources.” Palmer has since tried to explain himself, reports the Wall Street Journal:

On Wednesday, Mr. Palmer said his comments weren’t aimed at either the Chinese community in Australia or the Chinese government.

“They were directed at one Chinese state-owned company that has failed to honor its agreements,” said Mr. Palmer, who is a member of Australia’s lower house of Parliament. “I have been an admirer of China and its people for many years.”

The lawmaker, whose conservative Palmer United Party wields the balance of power in the upper house of Parliament, has for years been engaged in a legal dispute with Chinese company Citic Pacific over royalties from an iron-ore mine in Western Australia. Mr. Palmer says Citic Pacific, a Hong Kong-listed unit of Chinese state-owned behemoth Citic Group, has failed to pay royalties as stipulated by a 2006 agreement to build and operate the mine.

[…] Asked about the business spat earlier this week on Australian national television, Mr. Palmer said: “I don’t mind standing up against the Chinese bastards and stopping them from doing it. I’m saying that because they’re communist, because they shoot their own people, they haven’t got a justice system and they want to take over this country. We’re not going to let them do it.” [Source]

The relevant remarks made by Clive Palmer, a member of the House of Representatives of the Australian Federal Parliament, are completely unreasonable and absurd, to which we express our strong condemnation.

We noted that Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott, Foreign Minister Bishop and other senior officials as well as people from all walks of life have publicly refuted Palmer’s words. This shows that Palmer is alone in what he said and did. [Source]

Clive Palmer, an Australian legislator and mining magnate, delivered a scathing harangue in a TV program on Monday, referring to the Chinese government as “bastards,” who “shoot their own people” and want to usurp control of Australia. He called Chinese resources companies “mongrels,” which send workers to destroy the wage system and take over Australian ports and plunder minerals for free.

This is the most vicious attack by one of the Australian elite in recent months.

Not long ago, Foreign Minister Julie Bishop and Prime Minister Tony Abbott also made bitter remarks against China without any reason, which was quite astonishing. Now Palmer’s “bastards” ravings have intensified this.

[…] China should consider imposing sanctions on Palmer and his companies, cutting off all business contacts with him and forbidding him and his senior executives into China. The sanctions could also be given to any Australian companies which have business dealings with Palmer’s. China must let those prancing provocateurs know how much of a price they pay when they deliberately rile us.

Australian society has been aware that Palmer crossed the red line too far and his remarks, along with those of Bishop and Abbott, pose a direct threat to Australian-Sino relations. Canberra is waiting for China’s reactions, from which they can assess the tenacity of Chinese diplomacy. [Source]

The Global Times makes no mention of Palmer’s later explanation that he only meant to curse Citic Pacific. The newspaper also turned Palmer’s phrase “shoot their own people” into “massacre their own people” (屠杀自己人民). This left room for netizens to speculate on the target of Palmer’s anger. When Sina Comment (新浪评论) posted the Global Times’s story to Weibo, netizens jumped in:

According to a detailed account posted on the EACS website, conference materials were seized and several pages removed from the conference program – including an advertisement for the Taiwan-based Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange, a conference cosponsor — after the chief executive of Confucius Institute Headquarters, Xu Lin, objected to the contents.

[…] Meanwhile the abstracts and programs were not in the conference organizers’ possession. According to the account on the EACS website (which is signed by Greatrex) the Confucius Institute Headquarters consented to the distribution of the conference abstracts after the removal of the first page, on which it was stated that the volume was produced with the support of the Confucius China Studies Program, and on the condition that all funding be returned. The conference program — which the Confucius Institute had no role in funding – was distributed to conference participants on July 24th but with several pages removed: pages 15 and 16, which had information about the Confucius China Studies Program and local restaurants; pages 19-20, which included information on speakers and a book exhibition organized by the Taiwan National Central Library; and pages 59-60, which included the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation advertisement and logos of other sponsors, as well as information on activities in the second conference location in the city of Coimbra.

When he realized that pages had been torn and knifed out, Greatrex said he directed the printing of a full-color, double-sided reprinting of the pages including the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation advertisement, which was distributed to conference participants on the bus to Coimbra. He objected to what he perceived to be Xu’s interpretation that Confucius Institute sponsorship of the conference would mean that she “owned” the conference materials. [Source]

Anger and disappointment resound in the recommended Weibo search results for “Hanban,” the abbreviated name of the office of the Ministry of Education which overseas Confucius Institutes. “This time Hanban has completely disgraced China,” writes 蔡源PYC. More Weibo commentary:

张鸣: Insiders say that Hanban is the Chinese government agency loved most by all those domestic and foreign culture charlatans. Don’t know if the people there are dumb or not, but they surely have a lot of money and are easily duped.

知情者说，现在各类国际国内的文化骗子，最喜欢的中国衙门，就是汉办。那里的人是不是傻不知道，但肯定钱多，而且比较好骗。

覃里雯: Many people are shocked that the director of Hanban could do something as horrible as tearing out the pages introducing the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation from the EACS conference program. I gave it a lot of thought, and realized she had to tear it out. If she didn’t and someone told on her, she could lose her job. Tearing out the pages, on the other hand, makes her a hero in the system. The EACS has always been soft. It can’t make it a big deal anyway. If you use this logic, you’ll understand it… Everything will make sense…